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darklydeliciousdesires · 2 years

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The Thief of your Heart - Chapter Four.

So, this was supposed to be landing tomorrow, but my little loves @vulgar-display-of-escapism and @mrnd93 couldn’t wait, so here it is! I want to extend my huge thanks to everyone for reading and leaving such glowing feedback. I literally cannot cope with the knowledge that people discuss this among themselves and fangirl so hard over it, my little story! Eeeek! You’re so lovely!

Previous chapters - One Two Three

Tag list - In the comments, please reply below to be added/removed

Words - 4,202

Warnings - 18+ content throughout. Minors DNI!

Belfast, 1995

“Oh my god, ahhh, fuck me, oh shit, yes!”

“Yeah, you fucking love it like that, don’t you, my dirty girl?”

“Yes! Oh fuck!”

“Who’d you belong to?”

“You!”

His hand smacked her ass hard, a red print left behind. “Too fuckin’ right you do, crazy baby. And who owns this pretty, tight little pussy, huh?”

“Ohhh, you do! For fuckin’ ever!”

With her hair wound around his fist, her back arched beautifully for him as he fucked her savagely from behind, her screams filling her flat, Chibs grinned. He was the man who had it all; the dutiful wife at home, raising their beautiful daughter, and the smoking hot girlfriend on the side, who fucked like a machine and let him do anything he wanted to her. And god, did she love him, too. Mostly, Fiona only really had love for their daughter at that point, their sex life almost non-existent by comparison. Abi made up for everything he was lacking in his marriage.

Yes, she made up for it. A thousand times over.

And as long as he could keep getting his cock hard, he’d reward her for that. Even if he was sore and exhausted. Sex multiple times throughout the night and the early hours was a worth exchange to keep Abi happy.

“Jesus Christ, you look so bloody hot, split wide around my cock. Fuck.” He couldn’t get enough of it, watching himself gliding in and out of her, releasing her hair and grasping her ass cheeks, smacking them in turn, growling with desire as she shunted back against him, her slick bathing him thickly. It made something unhinged and rampant charge through him, witnessing just how aroused she got for him.

Again, he would reward it, by giving her the kind of pounding she thrived upon.

Turning her over, he sank back into her before pulling her up so she was astride him, bouncing her on his cock, spanking her a little more as he devoured her neck, glimmers charging through him at her moans. Those sounds, dear god. Her vocal expressions were the sexiest thing he’d ever heard. Holding her tightly to him, he stood up off the bed and moved to press her into the adjacent wall, hands grasping her tightly under her thighs as his broad chest pressed into hers, her nipple piercings adding delicious friction upon his skin.

He slowed the pace, but daggered her hard and deep, rolling his hips up into her so fully, it made her whimper with each exhale, feeling his lips at her neck, kissing and nipping at the column of her throat, her arms tightening around him. God, she felt like utter heaven.

Needing to be even deeper inside her than he already was, He carefully slid his arms under her knees, pushing her up the wall a little further while grasping her perfect, peachy bum so she was held there by his strong forearms, her legs opened wider, facilitating him to drive into her fully. Repeating the mantra of ‘don’t fall over, don’t drop her, don’t shoot your load’ through his head over and over allowed him the concentration needed to fuck her in what was quite a precarious position for a man half a bottle of whiskey in to attempt, but it did mean none of those things happened as his hips began to pound against her like a jackhammer, her wetness dripping out onto his balls, she was so massively turned on.

Of course, as an attractive man, an outlaw to boot - which he’d found to be a sure-fire bonus to women dropping their drawers for him at the snap of his fingers - he still had great sex with beautiful women, but in nowhere near the matching intensity or feeling as he had with Abi, the faces of the women he fucked all fading out, lacking any kind of distinction to commit to memory. Hell, even when he was inside them sometimes, if he thought on what he had with Abi for too long, he’d glaze over.

“Hey, are you even interested in this?” Sarah asked. Or was in Sasha? He wasn’t sure. He hadn’t been paying attention. She had his pre-requisites, nice tits and long legs. That was good enough.

“Yeah, lass. Yeah, I am.” He smiled, that tilt of his mouth not quite reaching his eyes, grasping her waist as he began to bounce her on his cock, shutting his eyes, picturing one woman in his mind. It had been eight days since he’d called her, eight days of having her on his mind just as much as he had after he’d been forced to leave her, eight days of feeling prickled by it, too, the sudden rush of feeling he’d been forced to deal with, everything he’d done well to bury, that survived within him as a dull ache of pain, being without his girl.

Pushing his thumb against her clit, he wanted to speed things up, impatient for it to be over with, wanting the forgettable woman off of him, another few minutes ensuring the flutters of her walls around him had him there with her. “Off.” he spoke, after at least giving her chance to catch her breath.

“You’re so fucking rude!”

He shrugged, pulling off the condom, knotting it and standing, yanking his jeans back up. “Aye, I am.” After disposing of the filled prophylactic into the trash, he walked over to the clubhouse bar, grabbing a beer as he sat down, the girl seeing herself out. His pissed off feeling was added to by the appearance of a moth flapping around his head, Chibs waiting for it to land on the bar before pounding his hand down.

“What?” Juice exclaimed, sitting bolt upright beside him, awoken sharply from the tequila induced stupor he’d drank himself into. He then looked at Chibs blearily, pointing, scanning the aftermath of the party, pass outs everywhere, Tig naked and asleep on the pool table with an equally bare woman draped over him, Happy over in the corner, railing a blonde against the far wall. “I thought you hooked up with that Samantha chick?”

Samantha. That was her name.

“I did. Got bored, blew my load and made it clear I didn’t need her to hang around.” He gulped back his beer, a much more sober Juice reaching for one, his mouth like carpet.

“Wow, even you’re usually a little more chivalrous than that,” he teased, hoping to raise a grin. No such luck.

“I’m not in the mood, Juicy.” And he hadn’t been for the last week. Where the club was concerned, he was focused and present, as always, but in the times between, he faded in and out of only being half there. Finishing his beer, he reached for the bottle of Johnie Walker, picking up a shot glass that looked reasonably clean, pouring himself out a measure and sinking it. Four more followed before he slid off the stool and made his way back to the couch, flopping down.

He hoped the four shots, added to the many he’d already sunk would send him to sleep, but instead, his mind was consumed with memories, especially the one where he’d first introduced a certain someone to Johnnie Walker black label...

Belfast, 1994

“Oh let the sun beat down upon my face, and stars fill my dream. I am a traveller of both time and space, to where I have been. And I have forgotten the rest of the words, to this song, la, la, la, la, la la!” A drunken Abi sang, staggering down the street towards the warehouse, Chibs’ arm locked around her, preventing her from wobbling too much.

“To sit with elders of the gentle race, this world has seldom seen. They talk of days for which they sit and wait, all will be revealed.” He spoke, filling in the gaps.

“That’s how it goes! Thank you!” she cried with mirth, fishing her keys from her pocket, wobbling a little and dropping them with a snort of laughter.

“Jesus, you’re wasted,” he chuckled, bending to pick them up from the patchy tarmac, lifting her over his shoulder as well. It was perhaps the easier method of transporting a drunken girl who was wearing a pair of six-inch heeled boots. He loved her in those boots, but something told him he wouldn’t be physically loving her until she’d sobered up a little. Abi was nothing if not determined, though.

“I’m going to give you the most amazing, hic, blowjob you’ve ever had... when we get back,” she told him, a little slurred, hiccups kicking in.

He chuckled, locating the correct key and opening the door. “Are you really, hen?”

“Aye! Just you wait!” She was asleep within five minutes of him placing her down on her bed, taking her jacket and boots off, throwing the duvet over to her and going over to the sofa in the lounge area of her open plan abode, grabbing his smoke box and rolling a joint. He was neither drunk nor tired, flicking through the TV channels but finding nothing of interest, searching her videos instead, deciding on the first Hellraiser film.

He was halfway through the second with another joint on the go by the time Abi stirred, sitting up with a little grumble, stripping off her clothes. “Hello, pisshead.”

“How long have I been asleep for?”

“Couple of hours.”

“Is that hash I smell?”

He held out the joint as she ambled over, luckily seeming a lot soberer than she’d been upon their arrival. “It is.” he confirmed, Abi sitting on his lap and taking a few puffs, Chibs stroking her nakedness, kissing her shoulder.

“I’ll be back, I’m just going for a shower. I feel grubby.”

“Aw, but I like you when you’re dirty, darlin’.” His joke made her chuckle, handing him the joint back and heading for the bathroom, cleansing her face of all makeup, feeling much fresher for the ingress of water, padding back out just as naked, throwing on his black shirt he’d left there, leaving it unbuttoned as she settled in his lap.

He passed the joint to her again, moving the shirt to kiss her chest a few times, hand stroking her stomach as she tucked her head beneath his chin, kissing his neck. She was still a little drunk, but not quite as much as she had prior to her nap and shower, content to stay awake. Whenever he was there overnight, she didn’t entertain wasting time in sleeping much. It wasn’t just because of her rampant desire to have him all over her either. She could spend hours talking to him.

“What would you do with your life, if you weren’t an outlaw?” she asked him a time later, the film finished, their location switched to her bed, her head rested to his chest, her fingers gently stroking the line of dark hair leading from his navel downwards.

His eyebrows twitched a little, contemplating her question. “Nobody’s ever asked me that before, you know. In turn, I cannae say I’ve ever particularly given it much thought. Mechanic, I guess. It’s about the only other thing I do well.”

She looked up at him, running her finger along the line of his jaw. “I don’t know about that. You do have incredible dick swinging skills, after all.”

He rumbled with laughter, kissing her forehead. “I’m not about to pimp out my services, though.”

“You’d earn a fortune.”

He could barely bite back the mischievous grin. “I’ll remind you of that, the next time you want to hop on.” He expected it, the slap he received to the chest, his laughter escalating. “What about you? If you weren’t army, what would you be?”

She turned away, reaching for her cigarettes, offering one to him and lighting up. “Tough question, since this is all I’ve ever known.”

He felt for her, because it was the simple truth. He doubted there’d been a time for her when her choices were ever her own. At least she loved it, what she was. Still, her trajectory was entirely at Michael’s hand.

“Maybe a kickboxing instructor. Makes sense, all I’d have to do is take a coaching course since I reached black belt, I’d be competent enough to do so.” That again was another of Michael’s ideas, putting the girls into martial arts to teach them discipline, and also how to defend themselves in hand-to-hand combat. He didn’t want their toughness to begin and end with holding knives or guns, especially since they were both fairly diminutive in stature. McGee had learned that the hard way, having a little tap around with a fourteen-year-old Monica and ending up with a broken rib.

“Aye, I can see you enjoying that. I think whatever reality we contemplate, it’ll include you handing people’s arses to them.”

“Do you think there’s an alternative reality where that’s what we are?”

Drawing on his cigarette, he contemplated that for a moment. “Possibly. It is a theory, that there could be any number of fringe realities lying right next to the one we’re experiencing. Parallel universes, they call ‘em.”

“I wonder if there’s one where you and me can be out in the open, together without having to hide it. No Fiona, and a version of my da who wouldn’t come for us guns blazing either,” she pondered, Chibs stroking her arm.

“The more time I spend with you, the more I see I want that to happen, you know.”

Her face was surprised at hearing him reveal that. “You’d really leave Fiona for me?”

He reached to stroke her cheek, nodding. “Aye, I think that’s where I’m at with it. The only things preventing me are your da and the guilt of Kerrianne coming from a broken home. She’s thirteen months old, after all. She’ll never have any memories of her parents being happy together, and I feel bad, depriving her of that. I suppose though, it could be argued that I’m not happy and I haven’t been for quite some time, so sticking around longer isn’t going to change that.”

She’d of course fantasised about it, dreamed he’d leave his wife for her, but the harsh brutalities of their reality always dampened them, Abi realistic enough to know it probably wouldn’t ever happen, and she’d have to be content to share him, love him in secret, not be the woman he was with out in the open.

It felt scary, but elating, smiling as she leaned to kiss him. “Sadly, I don’t think my da will be an issue for much longer. The chemo isn’t working. They’re beginning doses of radiotherapy as well, but it doesn’t look good.”

He pulled her close to him, stroking her back. “Ahh, darlin’, I’m sorry. You know I know how it is.” His own father had passed of Hodgkins Lymphoma when he was thirteen, so he knew her turmoil. “Maybe we’ll talk about it more further down the road, ay? We’ve plenty of time.”

Except they didn’t. Neither of them knew it then, but at that point, they only had six months left together, before everything changed forever. As he lay on the couch in a boozy haze, finally drifting off, he imagined her there next to him, her head tucked beneath his chin, her soft snuffles of sleep, her breath fluttering across his chest. The memory was nothing compared to the reality he’d once taken for granted, but it was something soothing, at least.

The coming days served well to take his mind off of it, everything concerning the club and the situation with Abel swirling like a storm, claiming a further casualty in Gemma, collapsing at hearing the news handed to her by Maureen Ashby, that Abel had arrived in Belfast, the club learning of Cameron Hayes’ demise at the hands of the army, and the hashing out of the plan to depart California, bound for Northern Ireland to locate the baby.

With as much as they could carry upon their backs packed, they boarded a plane organised by Elliot Oswald, each of them focused and determined to do whatever they could upon arrival to bring Abel back into the fold, return him to his family, all while Chibs wondered too, would he be returning to the one he’d been snatched from so many years ago? He hadn’t told her of his impending arrival, typing out the message at least twenty times in different wordings, only to grunt in frustration and delete his words. Would she even be there? He didn’t have a clue. She could still be in Africa for all he knew.

Halfway through the flight, while everyone else was asleep, he remained awake, his fingers turning over the cross pendant on the chain around his neck, visions flashing through his mind of seeing it around hers, imagining her smile, how he used to grab it and pull her close to bestow kisses upon her beautiful lips, when she’d taken it off and put it around his neck. Walking away from her flat for the last time had killed him. Leaving Ireland without his girlfriend, knowing he’d never see her or his beautiful daughter again. Even the part of him that still loved his wife was eclipsed by the agony of separation from his darling crazy baby.

One year, and she’d changed his life and claimed his heart forever.

“I’d ask what was on your mind, sweetheart, but I can guess,” Gemma piped up, sitting beside him, her hand stroking his forearm.

He snorted a brief burst of laughter, turning to her. “Am I that obvious?”

Stroking his hair, she ran her fingers over the creases denting his forehead. “These are.”

“I dunno, Gem. Going back to it, where it all happened. Of course, finding the bairn is the priority, but...ahh...” he muttered, sighing heavily as he trailed off.

“She might not be there,” Gemma reasoned.

“Aye, and what if she is?”

“If she is, then she is. Would it really be so bad, to see her again? Might help, putting it all to bed.”

He scratched his chin, half shrugging. “Or stir it all back up again, which is the last thing I need.”

Gemma looked puzzled for a moment, leaning away a little as she viewed him. “You make it sound like it’s all still close to the surface, this you and Abi thing.”

“When I think about it for too long, it is,” he confessed, smiling thinly. “Wasn’t Fi, who was the love of my life.”

“I was under the assumption she was just a bit of fun.” Gemma saw exactly how wrong that supposition had been just by the look on his face.

“She was that, yeah. Made me cry laughing, fuckin’ amazing lay, all round absolute firecracker, she was. Quickly, though, she became so much more.”

She made an inquiring face, her eyes scrunching as she viewed him carefully, expectantly.

“I was ready to leave Fiona for her, Gem.” Well, that was news to her. Taking a few moments to contemplate, though, it wasn’t too much of a reach to believe. She’d only met Abi once, when she’d visited Ireland with Clay a year after John had died. From her reckonings, it must have been very close in time to when they’d begun their affair. Abi was as fearless and mentally strong as Michael, and as beautiful and spirited as Bridie. They’d bonded during her trip, Gemma thinking a great deal of the young girl... as well as being shit scared of her.

There’d always been something she’d found within Fiona to be a little stifling and uptight, but Abi, she had a certain zest, a zeal about her. Yes, she was hardened, her intensity scary, her propensity for rage even more so, very much a product of her father’s upbringing, but she sparkled. Chibs, from what she knew of his tastes, always tended to lean towards women who had that glint of mischief in their eye. He liked them wild, and Abi was most certainly that. “Now that I think about it, I’m none too surprised by that.” she confessed, smiling, reaching to squeeze his shoulder. “So, the love of your life, huh? Even after all this time?”

He shifted in his seat, stretching. He began to nod, pulling his wallet out and showing her the picture of them he kept safely in there. “I carry her with me always. If my love for that girl was a fire, all the water in the world wouldn’t be capable of putting it out. Even for all her faults, too. Her ridiculously bad temper, her inability to listen to reason, the fact she’s nothing short of a fire hazard in the kitchen and can’t cook anything other than curry to save her life. Curry that was so spicy, you needed an asbestos lined mouth to eat it.” he laughed softly there, remembering her almost setting her flat on fire while grilling cheese on toast.

Studying the picture, Gemma noticed something glaring; she’d never seen him look so happy. “That’s very emotionally sincere for you, darlin’, I have to say.” His words truly had taken her aback, though.

“Aye,” he agreed, thumb stroking Abi’s image. “She stirs it in me, if I let her. Most of the time, I keep it well buried. Hearing her voice again, though, when I called her at Clay’s request to see if she knew anything, it shot right back up like a fucking flare.”

“Hence the trepidation,” she assumed, Chibs nodding.

“I’ll be hitting up Seamus for a fucking joint as soon as we land.” She laughed softly at his words, leaning to kiss his head.

“Share it with me?” she could do with a good smoke, all things considered.

He smiled. “Done.”

While they were in the air, Abi was walking into the SAMBEL clubhouse, a set of very large arms opening to receive her with a warm smile. “I heard you got back, but you’ve taken your time showing your face.” McGee spoke in his soft lilt, hugging her warmly. He’d always been so fond of Abi, Monica too, knowing them from infants, such was the depth of his friendship with their parents.

“Sorry, I’ve been catching up on sleep, enjoying me ma’s cooking, too.”

He rumbled a laugh, gesturing to the bar stool next to where he’d been residing, going round to fetch them a couple of fresh, cold beers from the fridge. “Still as useless in the kitchen as you always were, then?”

“I resent that!” she cried, punching his shoulder playfully when he sat back down.

“A fine soldier you are, but a good cook, you most definitely aren’t, so.”

“I make a mean curry,” she reasoned, McGee having to concede somewhat.

“Aye, if you enjoy having your face ripped off from the spice.” Sipping his beer, he eyed her, laughing through his nose at her face.

“I make good pasta, too.”

He almost choked on his beer. “You make abominations. Pasta, with melted cheese and gravy?”

“It works!”

“Jesus fuckin’ wept,” he chuckled. “Wrong, you are.”

“Don’t want me to make you fellas dinner then, no?”

“I’d rather go to the dodgy chippy down on Dale End.”

“Rude,” she chirped, “that you’d rather wish the wild shites upon yourself!”

He laughed richly, shaking his head. Anyone in the area knew well to avoid Dale End chip shop if they didn’t want to be welded to a toilet for most of the following day. “It’s good to see you, kid.”

“Aye, good to be back.”

“And now that you are, I need to make you privy to something,” he began. “I wanted you to hear it from me.”

She could guess. “Does this have something to do with Cameron Hayes snatching Jackson Teller’s son, and turning up dead for it?”

“It does, but more pertinently, it means what follows. SAMCRO are on their way over here as we speak, Filip included.” Her heart all but stopped.

“I thought the word on the street was that the babe wasn’t with Cammie when he arrived?” she needed to distract herself from the fact that he was currently edging ever closer to her, and everything that information stirred within. McGee saw it in her eyes, though, the dilation of her pupils, her throat constricting as she gulped.

He straightened a little, taking another swig of his beer as she lit a cigarette, accepting the one offered to him. “The boys, they need to see it in order to believe, and for that I don’t blame them at all.” He watched her trying to hold herself together in light of what she’d just learned, pointing to the bottles behind the bar. She couldn’t kid him. “Single of double?”

“Treble?”

“Aye.” He got up, furnishing her with the required measure, bringing the bottle back with him, Abi bolting the whiskey back. “Better?”

“No.” Another measure was duly poured and swiftly sank. “Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

He nudged her with his elbow, pouring another measure. “You’ll be grand.”

Keith McGee had a lot more faith in her than she did herself over that notion.

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magxit · 2 months

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did you see news about this new show? I know you like derry girls so I wanted to send along! https://variety.com/2024/tv/global/derry-girls-lisa-mcgee-new-series-how-to-get-to-heaven-from-belfast-netflix-1235943003/

Oh yes I am excited to see what it is all about.

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twelve-kinds-of-trouble · 8 months

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the Derry Girls creator is making a new series ??? Set in Belfast ??? It’s a comedy thriller????? And it’s called How to Get to Heaven From Belfast ???(

#IM SSO EXITE

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just-hyperfixed-ok · 8 months

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Exciting news for Derry Girls fans!

New show by Lisa McGee has been greenlit by Channel 4 🥳

#derry girls #channel 4 #new series #tv

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qudachuk · 8 months

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Channel 4 commissions Lisa McGee's new comedy-thriller How To Get To Heaven From Belfast.

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deadlinecom · 8 months

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markwatkinsconsumerguide · 3 years

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Consumer Guide / No.111 / American musician, Barbara Markay, with Mark Watkins.

MW : Why decide (initially) to switch from making classical music to pop?

BM : It happened during my first year at Juilliard College toward the end of the school year. It was in their new building at Lincoln Center, and I was practicing the piano in one of their practice rooms on the 5th floor, which had windows and a beautiful view of the streets below and the whole Lincoln Center area. I was taking a little break, and was looking out the window and thought to myself that I should be down there experiencing life and meeting interesting people, instead of practicing piano all day long! I had gotten into the Juilliard prep department / pre-college division when I was 10 years old, and had been a classical pianist for a long time. Maybe it was time for a change!

After that day in the practice room, I started to think about this more and more, especially every time I got a practice room with a “window on the world” so to speak. I started to think about all those people walking around on the streets, and who among them was actually going to be interested in listening to classical music. I thought that I might be wasting my musical talent on my present studies as a pianist and composer, and that I was much more interested in talking to people and finding out what they were thinking and why they said and did the things they did.

I became more and more interested in writing lyrics, which turned into my first pop songs. I realized that I could communicate the music I had inside me via pop music better than just performing classical music, because I could write about the whole new exciting culture of the times with no narrow, preordained musical style restrictions, or older musical rules. I could write and say whatever I wanted to! It was a brand new world for me! And so much fun! I still appreciated and loved classical music, and graduated from Juilliard college at the end of the four years, but I was now writing these funny, risqué, pop songs, just piano and voice, and everyone I played them for loved it!

We had academic studies as well as music classes as part of our program, and one of these classes was English literature, which I suddenly was great at. I don’t know where this understanding of human beings came from, or my love for reading English literature, but one day my English teacher, Beatrice Taub (who also taught at Columbia University), asked me after class if I really really was sure, that being a classical pianist and composer was really what I wanted to do with my life, because I was exceptionally good at literature. She suggested that I might take some extension classes at Columbia University to explore it further, maybe transferring to Columbia eventually.

It was then that I realized that these songs I was writing were going to be a better career path for me because they involved both writing and music, and I got that encouragement to continue with pop music. There was also another class I took that the music students would take together with the actors, that also was encouraging me to continue to write pop music.

Some of the people in my class were destined to be really famous actors, and one of them was Robin Williams. I felt more at ease in this class because they were mostly all actors, and had broader interests than the music students, I felt. Robin asked me one day to play some more of my songs for him, because he wanted to do a show out of them. He said he just loved the humor and the music I had put to the songs. He said he wanted to do some kind of a musical review with it. He was very funny even then. Just a natural comic, but also a great actor. Nothing came of it at that time, but my songs were eventually made into many musical reviews years later.

That was the beginning of my pop musical career.

Christopher Reeve, Kevin Spacey, Christine Baranski (1974), Kelsey Grammer, Kevin Kline, Patty LuPone, William Hurt, and more, were all actors who were part of the new acting department at the new Juilliard building at Lincoln Center. Eventually, years later, they would put in a classical guitar department, and a jazz department, which would have been unheard of before the new building came into being. Before these new times, Juilliard considered classical guitar to be “folk” music, and jazz wasn’t even on their radar. I guess someone was thinking like me, and these other forms of music needed to be heard and expressed as well as traditional classical music. So I think it was in the 1980s they got Sharon Isbin (fabulous classical guitarist) to head up the new guitar department, and Wynton Marsalis to head up the new jazz department to get these new genres started at the new Juilliard.

So much for my very formative Juilliard years!

These early songs were part of my piano & voice comedy act that was very popular at the time. A lot of people compared me to being a musical Joan Rivers. ‘It’s All Rite’ was part of this set of songs. I went to the UK on vacation soon after graduating college, and met Lee Allen, a music promoter with Carousel Artists (I think that was the name of his company) who booked me on a college tour of England and Ireland. Eventually, I put a small group together and performed everywhere. I played at the New University of Ulster, Belfast, and I opened for 10CC at, I believe, Kings College in London, and played many other colleges as well. What a great time I had, and everyone really liked the songs, including the risqué ones! And I just loved England! But then it became time to return to the states.

MW : Where does your music fit in terms of categorisation / the music scene?

BM : It wasn’t until the mid-1980s that I started writing more serious pop songs, not the early comedy stuff anymore. That was just after I had put out ‘It's All Rite’, the 12” dance, salsa single version of the song, and it was such a huge international hit. After that, I got interested in metaphysics - the invisible world so to speak - and more philosophical and spiritual matters. I found my first and very great meditation teacher, Anne Elizabeth Cooper, in New York City, and studied metaphysics with her for two years. It absolutely changed my life! I developed a totally different point of view of everything! I started writing songs more along these lines, and also songs about how people relate to each other on deeper levels. I needed to grow as a writer and artist, so this new path I took expanded my views of life and consciousness level.

Some of my early pop albums like Change To Come and Heart Like A Song contain some of my favorite and most prized songs, like ‘Still Need You’, ‘Change To Come’, ‘I Am The River’ and ‘Fallen Angel’ from the Change To Come album. And from the Heart Like A Song album, my favorites are, ‘In The Silence’, ‘You Are What You Believe’, ‘Hands Of The Artist’ and ‘All That I Am’. You can tell by just the titles how I had shifted focus and had finally grounded myself in more meaningful songs that brought in a brand new audience.

After those two albums. I continued expanding to world beat grooves with the Shambhala Dance album, which won best dance/dub/club album of the year (New Age Reporter finalist 2005 Lifestyle music award!). ‘Atlantis’, the first cut on the album, got great reviews and lots of airplay, even today it’s still being played. It’s been called “a meditation through movement”, and, “an exotic voyage of mysterious flamenco, Asian and middle eastern melodies, full of powerful world beat grooves beautifully blended together to create an atmosphere of intense, vital emotions both sensual and meditative at the same time” (Wind and Wire magazine, April 2005, Bill Binkelman).

I continued exploring different styles with a meditation album, Heaven And Earth, which is a continuous 50 minute meditation. I got and still get a lot of plays in the yoga studios and meditation classes with this one and the Shambhala Dance album. But you can see how my shift to more metaphysical and spiritual music has carried me into these different, but related styles. I even composed a musical rendition of the ancient, venerated prayer, ‘The Great Invocation’, given to humanity by ascended Tibetan master Djwhal Khul. I have shifted styles as I matured and explored a more expanded and deeper understanding of what I wanted to express musically.

MW : How are you using social media to stream / promote your music on platforms such as Spotify, iTunes etc?.

BM : It’s great! You can see all of the albums and singles I’ve done on Spotify, iTunes, and the other streaming services right away. So can all the other artists who put content out there. Everyone had to switch to streaming for the great international exposure. There’s nothing like it!

MW : Two of your early records were banned. Did you set out to challenge the mainstream with titles ‘It’s All Rite To F*ck All Nite…’ and ‘Give Your Dick To Me’?

BM : I was never really “banned”. What happened is that I produced the first 12” dance single version of ‘It’s All Rite’, and took it to all the record labels, which were mostly all in New York at the time. Everyone absolutely loved the record! Everyone absolutely wanted a few copies for themselves and their friends. But nobody had the balls to put it out into the market!!!! They were all afraid of repercussions, censorship, and their reputations! So I decided that I would put it out myself, something nobody had done at the time! I thought the record needed to be heard. I found a pressing plant in New Jersey, who were fine with pressing it up, then I went to an art store and got some “press type” and designed my own album cover. I got a friend of mine to take a picture of me, and voila! I had an album ready to go. I had no monies to promote the record, only just enough to record it and press it up. I figured that if I could get it heard by some people, maybe I could get some interest in it and maybe sell a few copies.

At that time, in New York and across the whole country, there were record pools, which were organizations of DJ’s who played the music in the dance clubs. I sent a 12” record (CD’s hadn’t been invented yet) to a list of record pools around the country, and to my surprise, I got a great response. Everyone wanted a copy to play. It was a salsa dance groove, something kinda new for mainstream clubs at the time, but the song was funny and danceable so everyone liked it and wanted to hear it. This was a time when you couldn’t get any airplay without a record label behind you. It was payola all the way. But what I could get was club play, and these DJ’s kept asking me for more and more records. And now people were asking the DJ’s where they could buy the record. So I had to get a distributor to put the records into record stores.

By this time, the record was being played in most all the clubs in the United States, but with no place to buy it. My first thought was to go to Sam Goody, one of the biggest record stores in New York at the time, and see if they would sell the record. They said yes, showing me a copy of some dance/club charts they had in the store that said that the record was #1 on the charts!!!!! I had no idea about these separate dance/club listings and was really excited that it was already charting. But there were about five dance charts around at this time, and ‘It’s All Rite’ was #1 on all of them! It stayed #1 for about five or six months in a row! It was a sensation! This started in about May of 1978, or 1979, I think, and ran thru September. Sam Goody gave me the very hard to get whole window display of my record, so did Colony records, another big record store in New York City at the time, and the rest is history! Other record stores followed.

Soon I realized that I needed a bigger distributor, so I contacted several in all the sections of the US, like the South, the Midwest, North Central, East Coast, West Coast, etc. They kept asking me for more and more records. I couldn’t figure out where the records were going. So one day I called my local one stop guy in Long Island City, and he said they were all going overseas. I asked where overseas, and he said, “Everywhere! Especially Holland.” Apparently, 12 miles off the coast of Holland was a ship that had a radio station broadcasting from it, and they could play anything that they wanted. My record was the number one request! Nobody could do anything about it to stop them, because they were in international waters. 12 miles out!!!

Since this was my first big hit, I was inexperienced as to what I needed to do next. It wasn’t too much later, about December of that year, I got a call from WEA International in Holland (Warner Brothers, Electra & Atlantic records all together) who said they wanted to license my record. It sounded great to me, so I took the deal. They published it in Europe, South America, England, Japan, Asia, etc. and promoted it in all the clubs. And I finally got legitimate airplay on it, because on the “B” side I had recorded the “clean” version, called ‘It’s All Rite To Truck All Nite’. Lots and lots of airplay everywhere! Finally!

It became #16 on the Billboard pop charts in the Benelux countries, and #2 on the charts in Paris, Michael Jackson being #1 at the time. WEA asked me for another single to put out, and I gave them, ‘Give Your Dick To Me’, and that was also very successful. I did the same thing with the “clean” “B” side, ‘Give Your Flesh To Me’.

So the bottom line is that if you have a record that everyone wants to hear, nothing will stop it from being heard. The people decided they wanted to hear ‘It’s All Rite’, and it squeezed itself through the cracks to be a big hit. Also, it started a new trend in music of what could be heard and played. Several DJ’s told me that I had really done something BIG with that song. They said it changed the music business forever! It opened the door for new things to come into the market, and then the people could judge for themselves whether they liked it.

Now getting back to your original question about being censored/banned, I really didn’t have any criticism for doing the record. People just wanted to get a copy of it and enjoy it. And I didn’t set out to “challenge” the system. I was simply expressing my views on what people were really thinking, and I did it via a danceable, funny, comedy record. I was just having fun!

Now, a lot of people took it seriously, literally, and that’s ok. Everyone has their own interpretation of things. That is what Art is for. To make people think. And that is what, ‘It’s All Rite’, did. It made people think, laugh, dance, party, and feel good! Remember, this was a time when Lenny Bruce had set a new standard, Joan Rivers was on the scene, along with Richard Pryor, George Carlin, etc. By the time I came along I took it all for granted that I would be able to put this record out. I wrote it when I was 19 years old and still in college, so that’s what you write when you’re that age. I didn’t care at all what people would think about me or this song!

Nobody I was aware of wrote anything negative about this “outrageous” song. One of the many reviews I got for my act (when I was performing all my funny songs with piano & voice around town in the late 1970s) was from Michael’s Thing, an LGBT magazine, New York City’s #1 weekly entertainment magazine and “going out guide” with reviews, comics, of all the performances, Art in the city, new and noteworthy etc. which said about my act, “…...she (Barbara) makes you laugh while she stabs you in the back!” I got nothing but praise for putting this song out! The LGBT community loved what I had done and fully supported me, along with great reviews from the Village Voice, and a nice write up from Billboard magazine by Roman Kozak. I also played at Huey’s Bar, a gay men’s bar, on Hudson street (west side of New York city near the Hudson river) for several months, through that whole summer, just piano and voice. It was a big hit!

MW : Tell me about your involvement with Carly Simon’s Coming Around Again album?

BM : I was doing synthesizer programming for a few of the songs on the album. The arranger I was working with was doing some arrangements for her new album, and I got to do some of the synth programming. It was lots of fun to be involved and to go to the recording sessions.

MW : …and the Michael Jackson (BAD) video…. also include any thoughts on Jackson’s charisma, ability (song & dance)….

BM : I never got to meet Michael Jackson, but I did get to meet Martin Scorsese who was really really interesting! He was asked to produce the video for the song. He came up to the office one day to discuss what kind of extra scored music was needed for the BAD video, music before the song started, and after the song was through. He was very intense, a real thinking kind of guy, and someone who knew what he wanted. He also has a great sense of humor! He impressed me as someone who really knows people. Meeting Scorcese was actually more exciting for me than meeting Jackson as he’s a real character!!! A mature adult!

MW : You’ve worked with Bruce Willis as a backing singer. Tell me about those times … also include your views on his abilities as an actor turned singer…

BM : Bruce Willis is a really great actor, and can play almost any part. That includes as a blues singer. The show we did was as his backup singers (along with two friends of mine) for the opening of the new Hard Rock Café in Austin, Texas. It was a very long day, full of rehearsals on stage with the band, and waiting for Bruce to arrive. As we tested mikes and stage positions, we could see a huge crowd starting to form in order to get a good view of the coming show. The press was there, and reported close to 100,000 people waiting to see this opening.

Bruce eventually got there, extremely exhausted. By the time the show started it was dark out, and everyone was excited. Then came the big moment when Bruce Willis came on stage, and everyone went wild! The band started to play and he started to sing. I was shocked by how well he could sing, and put over a song. It was a real “performance”.

He may not have all the technique of a “professional” singer, but what he has is better. He can make you get into the song, feel the song, …it’s not really the voice but the performance that’s spectacular. So close up to me. I could really see why he’s considered one of the great actors of our time. Acting, singing and performing are all connected. And he puts it all together beautifully.

MW : Describe a typical weekend….before lockdown and during…

BM : Well, I used to love to go to the ocean and watch the sunset a lot, then meet my friends for dinner in one of the great restaurants by the beach or in town. Before lockdown there were great movies to see, not just at home (these days) but at the real movie houses. Plenty of them around in the “old” days. During lockdown everyone has to stream movies at home. At least streaming is safe!

I also used to like to work out at the gym, but you can’t do that yet, so I’m hoping that sometime in the near future that will become viable again. Sometimes it’s fun just to take a ride up pacific coast highway and breathe in the sea air and see the beautiful scenery. You can still always do that.

There are lots of farmers markets around town, so I always go on the weekends to shop for fresh, whole, organic fruits and veggies! That’s always fun, and sometimes I go with my friends too.

Eating good, fresh, organic foods is my entire “Health Plan”! You are what you eat! So far, so good! And I can do this all year long. And during this lockdown, we just all wear masks. It’s fun being at the farmers markets and seeing all the chefs from all the great restaurants in town shopping for their weekly recipes with those big shopping carts they push thru the market. They buy whole boxes of produce and everything else sold there.

MW : What is your favourite…Carly Simon single?

BM : I think that would be ‘Mockingbird’, especially the 2015 remaster. James Taylor sounds great on this, and the two of them together just fit together perfectly. This remaster is from Songs From The Trees (a musical memoir collection). I’m glad they did this, because this is a classic! You can hear all the instruments clearly, the voices are very present, and the whole thing is a pleasure to listen to. Musical tastes change, but the classics will remain with us from “gentler” times.

MW : AND your favourite… Bruce Willis film?

BM : (I can’t choose just one!)

The Whole Nine Yards : hysterically funny!!! I laugh every time. The Fifth Element is a real classic! I see it again every time it’s on TV. Bruce Willis is fantastic in that “deadpan” character he plays. And the score by French composer Eric Serra is superb. Hip, powerful, rhythmic, smooth, jagged, everything needed to match the screen scene.

But the music stands alone if you just listen to the score by itself without the movie. I think they sold a lot of the music score. The Sixth Sense - so powerful, and metaphysical! It’s right up my alley! And Bruce Willis has a knack for finding well written screenplays! That’s a big key to the success of the movies he’s in.

And since they’re so well written, he has an opportunity to really show off his talent and get into those great parts.

MW : AND your favourite… Michael Jackson album?

BM : I think I like the Thriller album the best. I love the songs, especially, ‘Beat It’, ‘Thriller’, and ‘Human Nature’. And it was so well produced by Quincy Jones, with pounding gritty grooves, and great songs.

MW : List, in order of preference, your Top 10 singles & albums of all-time…

BM : (I have the original CD’s of this music, and still call them CD’s, but I’m sure this music is all streaming/downloads by now!)

1. Famous Blue Raincoat: songs by Leonard Cohen, studio album by singer Jennifer Warnes: exquisite, perfect singing of songs with her crystal clear voice! What a superb collaboration this was! I wish they had made more albums together like this one! A true classic! When I first heard it I couldn’t believe what I was hearing! Songs so well written, songs with a real message, and so well sung and produced.

2. I also love Leonard Cohen’s, ‘Hallelujah’, sung by anyone! It gives me chills every time! Powerful and hauntingly beautiful! The best cover of it that I love is K.D. Lang’s version. (I think it was on her album, Hymns Of The 49th Parallel, 2004).

3. Bach: Sonatas & Partitas: violinist: Itzhak Perlman: The sub-title of this 2 CD set put out by EMI classics says it all: “Great Recordings of the Century”, which is aptly titled!!! I can listen to this album at any time, and it will put me into a deep trance. I can’t stop listening.

Itzhak Perlman is an absolute master of the violin, and these solo compositions are not only some of Bach’s finest works, but Perlman’s rendition of them is flawless. He understands what the composer was trying to accomplish, and every time I listen to this it feels like he is showing us the true soul of humanity! The longing, the passion, the “reaching to the Light”! The thing about this kind of classical music is its very high vibration! I think it does make you smarter!

4. Then we have Jorge Aragao and his live album entitled Ao Vivo (which means “live”). Another album I have listened to for years. He’s a Brazilian singer/songwriter, and the songs are all sung in Brazilian Portuguese. But don’t let that stop you from listening. It’s exciting, passionate and very well recorded. It has the whole flavor of Brazil in it! Recorded in 1999.

The last song is a great rendition of ‘Ave Maria’. A true classic! (I took a great vacation to Brazil for a month once in the mid-2000s and this album is the real deal! The Brazilians absolutely Love him!)

5. Edith Piaf: 30e Anniversaire 2 cd set (probably on all the streaming services by now). All the songs are beautifully recorded, written, produced and her voice is extraordinary and present. It gives you the whole culture and passion of the French. It always puts me at a French café with friends and great great food! If you’ve never heard Edith Piaf, it’s well worth a listen.

There was a wonderful movie on her life called La Vie en Rose which I also recommend to get the whole feeling of this music. And I listen to this music often, especially when I’m feeling like there’s no culture west of New York City! She saves the day every time!

6. John Lennon: Imagine: I think everyone knows this is a classic! It’s a positive message!

7. The Eagles: Hotel California the whole album, but especially the title song, ‘Hotel California’: It never gets old!

8. Bach: English Suites performed by pianist Andras Schiff: he’s a Bach specialist, and has a great insight into what Bach intended with this great recording: Part of my regular listening.

9. Buena Vista Social Club: it really gives you the heart and soul of Cuba. I think the reason this album was such a hit when it was first put out is the huge amount of heart, passion, and honesty it evokes. You can feel it’s the real deal. Nothing fake here!

10. And last but not least, two albums that were put out by Putumayo a while back, called Brasileiro and Samba Bossa Nova. They are compilations of several Brazilian artists and styles, including bossa nova, folk, light samba, and I think some other styles too, beautifully put together. They are calming, gentle, rhythmic and haunting, and a great way to wake up in the morning. So many positive vibes! So musical and unpretentious!

MW : Where / what was the best meal you’ve ever enjoyed and what was the company like?

BM : Well, all I can remember is that it was in a Paris restaurant, and I was taken there by a record company executive to discuss publishing my music through a Paris company. I remember she told me that the closer you get to Paris from anywhere in the world, the better the food gets!!!

And I wasn’t disappointed!

The meal was some kind of spectacular steak, mousse au chocolate for desert, and fine red wine throughout the meal. Cheeses for dessert! (that was more dessert after the dessert!) And it was the atmosphere and vibe, not just of the restaurant, but of Paris, and the French people and their culture that I found so fabulous! I love the French and they loved me back!!!!

MW : What can we anticipate coming from you later on in 2021?

BM : I’m currently thinking about something along the lines of my previous Shambhala Dance and Heaven And Earth albums. Worldbeat and with a sleek groove.

It takes time to compose something like that.

It will be announced on my website when it’s done. www.barbaramarkay.com and I will put it out on the streaming services / downloads as usual.

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bountyofbeads · 4 years

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Will Brexit Bring the Troubles Back to Northern Ireland? https://nyti.ms/2rHSWA7

This is a fascinating look at the very real and immediate consequences of Brexit. While looking back at the violent sectarian history and what Brexit could awaken in the very near future. WELL WORTH THE TIME

"In Northern Ireland, Brexit is stirring up an especially volatile brew. Sectarian tensions have been roiling in one form or another since at least the 17th century, when King James I encouraged the migration of Protestant colonists from Scotland and England to the northern Irish province of Ulster, where they enjoyed special privileges. An act of the British Parliament in 1920, during the Irish War of Independence, led to Ireland’s partition, creating a Protestant-majority Northern Ireland. Catholic grievances over discrimination fueled animosities that helped precipitate the Troubles. By the time of the Good Friday Agreement, some 3,600 people had been killed and tens of thousands injured. The peace deal created a power-sharing system of government, but it did not bring reconciliation."

Will Brexit Bring the Troubles Back to Northern Ireland?

As the United Kingdom confronts the prospect of dissolution, old factions are bracing for the possibility of new violence.

By James Angelo's | Published Dec. 30, 2019 | New York Times | Posted January 2, 2020 |

Belfast, like Berlin and Sarajevo, draws many visitors not despite its history of murderous conflict but because of it. Guides there take tourists to “peace walls,” the tall barricades of corrugated metal and concrete erected during the sectarian conflict, known as the Troubles, that began in 1968 and ravaged Northern Ireland for three decades. The walls were built to divide Protestant and Catholic enclaves and to prevent people from killing one another as the spiraling cycle of attacks took hold. Today tourists from around the world visit the walls and take selfies. This type of tourism is more peculiar in Belfast than in some other cities shaped by a legacy of atrocity. You can visit the intact parts of the Berlin Wall, for instance, with the knowledge that the wall no longer serves its original purpose. In Belfast, however, the walls are still there to divide, their continued presence deemed necessary to prevent a resurgence of violence.

Tours of the peace walls are often given by ex-paramilitary combatants who were active during the Troubles. The bald, stout, tattooed driver who took me on one such tour last June said he was “connected” to a paramilitary called the Ulster Defense Association, or the U.D.A., which was responsible for the killing of hundreds. He described himself as “no angel” during the Troubles and asked that I use only his first name, Robert, so as not to attract attention from the authorities — those involved can still face criminal prosecution — or from old foes. “We’re all paranoid as hell here,” he told me shortly after I got into his van. “The war is not over. Far from it.”

Robert had a quick, friendly smile and a fast wit that made it a little hard to imagine his past paramilitary connection. But those were almost unimaginably violent times. In the rote manner of tour guides everywhere, Robert told me his father was a U.D.A. member who in 1975 was shot dead by the Irish Republican Army, or I.R.A., the most lethal of the paramilitary groups, at the bus depot where he worked. Robert himself had dodged three I.R.A. assassination attempts, he said, and the organization also “blew up” his brother-in-law and murdered seven of his friends. We pulled up to a section of the peace wall in an industrial part of West Belfast that divides the neighborhood around Falls Road, heavily Catholic, from that around Shankill Road, which is heavily Protestant. Robert pointed out the metal gate that opens during the day to allow traffic to pass and closes again at night. In 2013, the government of Northern Ireland announced a goal of removing the walls within 10 years, but Robert was against this. The situation, he said, was still too turbulent. “We’re not ready for it,” he said. “I’m sure you’re probably fed up with hearing about Brexit,” he said. “But people are worried about a bad deal, the wrong deal or no deal.” If things went badly, he added, “I think we’re going to need these walls more than ever.”

The 1998 peace deal, known as the Good Friday Agreement, subdued the violence in Northern Ireland, but it did not resolve the underlying sectarian conflict that propelled it. Northern Ireland is in the United Kingdom. “Unionists” or “loyalists” — who tend to identify as Protestant and as British — want it to remain that way. “Nationalists” or “republicans” — who tend to identify as Catholic and Irish — want a united Ireland. The peace between these factions was facilitated by a tangentially related circumstance: Both the United Kingdom and Ireland had by then joined the European Union. This arrangement ensured uninhibited trade across the border, helping to render it virtually invisible and placating many Irish nationalists with circumstances they deemed acceptable if not ideal.

At the time the peace agreement was signed, however, a different movement was growing across the Irish Sea in England: a skepticism of the European Union, bubbling up among voters on both ends of the political spectrum but embraced in particular by the conservative hard right. As populist, nationalist parties grew in strength across Europe and much of the globe, this skepticism culminated in the 2016 Brexit referendum. Few of the hard-line politicians who advocated Brexit seemed to consider the consequences their push to “take back control” would have on the delicate peace in Northern Ireland or, for that matter, on the cohesion of the United Kingdom itself. In the more than three years since the referendum, the matter of Northern Ireland has presented a unique and treacherous stumbling block to any agreement between the British government and the European Union on the terms of withdrawal. How would the United Kingdom “take back control” of its borders without hardening the Irish border, thereby endangering the Good Friday Agreement? However this question was answered, one side or the other in the sectarian divide was bound to be upset.

On Dec. 12, voters in the United Kingdom gave Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Conservative Party a sweeping parliamentary majority based on his pledge to “get Brexit done.” His success, attributable in part to the electorate’s sheer exhaustion with the Brexit limbo, means the United Kingdom will almost certainly leave the European Union by Jan. 31. This occasion, however, will by no means bring closure to a United Kingdom that has become so deeply fractured — not only along party lines but also by geography — that many people predict the most salient and enduring consequence will be a kind of monumental self-immolation: the breakup of the United Kingdom itself.

As if to illustrate the volatility of the matter, Robert pulled up to a mural on the Protestant side of the wall. Murals are ubiquitous on both sides of the divide, sanctifying former combatants who are invariably considered coldblooded murderers on the opposite side. This one, repainted around the time of the Brexit referendum, depicted Stephen McKeag, a commander in the U.D.A. known as Top Gun, against a cloudy sky, as if floating in heaven. “If you believe the stories you hear, he was one of the ones who won most of the trophies, what they call a trophy for the amount of people he has supposed to have allegedly killed,” Robert told me. McKeag, indeed known as one of the U.D.A.’s most lethal assassins, died in 2000 of a drug overdose. “Remember With Pride,” the mural read. Several tourists snapped photos. Robert got out of the van and shook hands with another tour guide, a man who looked much like him, with a bald head and dark sunglasses. “Thirty years ago, we would have been trying to kill each other,” Robert said. The other guide, apparently a republican ex-combatant, nodded in agreement. They exchanged a few niceties. Robert got back in the van.

“We’re friendly, but we don’t fully trust each other,” Robert said, his tone quickly changing. He showed me a picture on his phone of the same man at a militant republican parade. He then showed me a video, taken the previous month, outside a wake for a former member of the Irish National Liberation Army, or I.N.L.A., a Marxist republican paramilitary group formed in 1974. The I.N.L.A. ostensibly decommissioned its weapons along with other paramilitary groups as part of the peace process. The video, however, showed six men in balaclavas. One of them carried an assault rifle. They lined up in formation, and the gunman fired several shots into the sky. The mourners applauded.

Robert pointed to the soaring twin steeples of a Catholic cathedral on the other side of the wall. The shots had been fired around there just a few weeks earlier, he said. “That’s why I say these guys have never gone away,” he added. “That’s why we don’t trust each other.” As long as people on this side of the wall felt threatened, he said, loyalist paramilitaries would remain. “You think we’re going to go away?”

While British euro-skepticism is far from new, its culmination in Brexit represents the most tangible manifestation yet of the re-emergence of the nationalist strains in Europe — and beyond — that the European Union was meant to temper. The British conservatives who advocated Brexit acted partly under pressure from the far-right U.K. Independence Party, which under its former leader Nigel Farage grew more popular in the years leading up to the referendum with a staunchly pro-Brexit, anti-immigration platform. Implicit in the “take back control” message employed by the “Brexiteers” were themes promoted by populist-right movements everywhere: a reassertion of national sovereignty coupled with the claim that only those who advocate this represent the true will of the people against a globalized elite. As far-right parties have risen across Europe, Brexit has provided them a concrete victory — and it’s possibly not the last, as such parties in countries like Italy, France and Hungary seek to corrode the European Union from within.

The more immediate consequence of Brexit, however, may be not the dissolution of the European Union but the dissolution of the United Kingdom. Brexit and Boris Johnson’s decisive election victory were propelled primarily by voters in England. The United Kingdom, however, is made up of three additional smaller countries — Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland — that contain nationalist movements of another sort. In Scotland and Northern Ireland in particular, left-wing nationalist parties perceive the source of unwanted foreign meddling to emanate from London rather than from Brussels. Majorities of people in Scotland and Northern Ireland, in fact, cast ballots in favor of remaining in the European Union, and many of these voters now see Brexit as a reason to split from the United Kingdom. This is particularly the case in Scotland, where the pro-independence Scottish National Party, or S.N.P., won a landslide victory in December. When Scotland held a referendum on independence from the United Kingdom in 2014, 55 percent of voters elected to remain. Now, in light of Brexit, the S.N.P. is calling for another referendum. Polls suggest the result would be much closer now. “Independence is coming,” Ian Blackford, the leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party in the British Parliament, said during a debate there in October. “We will take our place as a proud European nation.”

In Northern Ireland, Brexit is stirring up an especially volatile brew. Sectarian tensions have been roiling in one form or another since at least the 17th century, when King James I encouraged the migration of Protestant colonists from Scotland and England to the northern Irish province of Ulster, where they enjoyed special privileges. An act of the British Parliament in 1920, during the Irish War of Independence, led to Ireland’s partition, creating a Protestant-majority Northern Ireland. Catholic grievances over discrimination fueled animosities that helped precipitate the Troubles. By the time of the Good Friday Agreement, some 3,600 people had been killed and tens of thousands injured. The peace deal created a power-sharing system of government, but it did not bring reconciliation. Currently, the two largest parties elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly are Sinn Fein — once the I.R.A.’s political wing — and the socially conservative Democratic Unionist Party, or D.U.P., which advocates continued union with Britain. The partisan rift between them has been so great that the assembly has not fully convened for nearly three years. Many people in Northern Ireland, exhausted with the sectarian paradigm, have tried to move beyond it; this is evident from the recent growth of the cross-community Alliance Party.

Still, the sectarian rift remains palpable in much of daily life, influencing everything from which soccer team locals support to the everyday language they use. Many Irish nationalists, for example, refer to Northern Ireland as “the North of Ireland.” Schools in Northern Ireland remain mostly segregated along religious lines, and children often learn disparate versions of history. Attempts to administer justice for past atrocities seem only to deepen divisions. A former British paratrooper known to the public as Soldier F is now on trial on charges of murdering two people during the massacre known as Bloody Sunday in 1972, when British troops opened fire on unarmed Catholic demonstrators in Londonderry, killing 13 that day. For many Irish nationalists, the trial is painfully belated and woefully insufficient. Many loyalists, however, see it as a witch hunt, and it’s not uncommon to see flags celebrating Soldier F’s parachute regiment fluttering in loyalist strongholds.

Sectarian tensions are most evident in the so-called interface areas, urban working-class neighborhoods where Catholic and Protestant communities live in proximity but often barely interact. In addition to the physical walls of separation — of which there are some 100 in Belfast alone — territory in such neighborhoods is demarcated by paramilitary flags hung by front doors or sometimes by painted curbs, either in the colors of the Union Jack or the Irish tricolor. Residents in these areas often avoid patronizing shops located on what is deemed enemy turf, even if they have to walk farther to buy what they want. These communities live “cheek by jowl, but in separate worlds,” John Brewer, a sociologist at Queen’s University Belfast, told me. Publicly funded cross-community programs for youths in these areas aim to bridge the rift. But poverty and unemployment in interface areas tend to be high, leaving many young men hopeless and vulnerable to radicalization. Rioting and violent clashes in these areas are not uncommon.

Attitudes on Brexit, too, largely fall along sectarian lines. A majority of Protestants in Northern Ireland — 60 percent — voted to leave the European Union, according to one survey, and the D.U.P., long skeptical of the European Union, backed Brexit. A majority of Catholics — 85 percent — voted to stay, a position also backed by Sinn Fein, in great part because many people feared that Brexit would result in a hardening of the Irish border. The fate of that border presented the main obstacle in negotiations between successive British conservative governments and the European Union on a withdrawal agreement. The European Union, mindful that a hard border would undermine the Good Friday Agreement and quite possibly lead to violence, wanted a deal that avoided customs checks at the border. In October, Boris Johnson found a partial solution by agreeing to a new customs border in the Irish Sea, between Britain and Northern Ireland; this means checks on goods traveling within the United Kingdom instead of on the Irish border. But hard-line unionists have been outraged by the deal, with some calling it the “betrayal act.” English conservatives, they believe, have abandoned Northern Ireland and endangered its place in the United Kingdom. At the same time, many Irish nationalists, though relieved that the immediate prospect of a hard Irish border has faded, have nevertheless been so angered by the uncertainty of the last years that they see continued membership in the United Kingdom as less tenable than ever.

Passions around Brexit are heated across the United Kingdom, but nowhere are the stakes potentially higher than in Northern Ireland. A 2015 report on paramilitaries drafted in part by MI5, the United Kingdom’s domestic intelligence agency, said that all the main paramilitary groups that operated during the Troubles remain intact; moreover, not all their weapons were decommissioned. The report’s authors considered it very unlikely that these paramilitaries would return to political violence, but the fact that they continue to hold on to weapons just in case seemed to underscore the fragility of the peace. At the same time, some so-called dissident republican groups have continued, since the Good Friday Agreement, to launch violent attacks in the name of achieving a united Ireland. The police judge the terrorist threat from these groups, including one calling itself the New I.R.A., to be “severe.” Dissident republicans have tried to use anger over Brexit as a rallying cry to win new recruits. Amid the confusion and bitterness sparked by Brexit, one thing seems clear: Northern Ireland’s delicate, hard-won equilibrium has been upset, and the consequences are potentially grave.

The headquarters of Saoradh, a small, self-declared political party whose name means “liberation” in Irish, is on a narrow street in Londonderry, Northern Ireland’s second-largest city, close to the Irish border. A mural on the facade of the building pretty well encapsulates the group’s outlook: It shows a masked paramilitary soldier wielding a rocket-propelled-grenade launcher under the slogan “Unfinished Revolution.” Northern Irish police officers say Saoradh is inextricably linked to the New I.R.A.

Inside the headquarters one afternoon in July, a thin and meticulously coiffed 27-year-old named Paddy Gallagher introduced himself to me as the party’s national press officer. While Saoradh calls itself a party, it does not engage in electoral politics, because this, as Gallagher put it, would mean becoming part of the “British infrastructure.” The party consists of “disaffected republicans,” he said, who “don’t believe the signing of the Good Friday Agreement was a good thing.” I asked him if the peace the agreement made possible wasn’t a good thing. He objected to the premise that such a peace exists. “The ongoing struggle for Irish unification and freedom hasn’t ended,” he said; people remain “willing and capable of carrying out acts of resistance.” He then provided an example: A few weeks earlier, a bomb was placed under a police officer’s car in Belfast. This was true. The officer spotted the bomb before getting in his car at a golf club, and it was safely defused; the New I.R.A. claimed responsibility. “I would assume that it was intended to kill that member of the British crown forces,” Gallagher told me.

On other occasions, the New I.R.A., which was formed in 2012, has killed intended targets. It claimed responsibility for attacks that killed two prison officers: a man named David Black, who was shot dead in 2012 in his car on the way to work, and Adrian Ismay, who died in 2016 after a bomb exploded under his van. The New I.R.A. killing that sparked the most attention and outrage came one night last April, during a republican riot in a Londonderry neighborhood called Creggan; when a masked rioter fired shots in the direction of an armored police vehicle, a bullet struck and killed Lyra McKee, a 29-year-old journalist who had arrived on the scene to report on the riot. A few days later, the New I.R.A. released a statement to a local newspaper saying that its volunteers were engaging “British crown forces” when McKee was “tragically killed,” depicting her death as collateral damage. Police officers later raided Saoradh’s headquarters as part of their investigation into the shooting, though no one has yet been charged with McKee’s murder. When I visited Creggan, I found signs posted on street lamps warning people not to cooperate with the police. “Informers will be shot,” read one of them, signed by the “I.R.A.”

Gallagher denied that Saoradh supports or has had links to the New I.R.A. — or any other armed groups — though he did not disavow their violent methods. “The Irish people can use any and all means necessary to achieve Irish freedom, whether it’s armed struggle or not,” he said. “The party believes that is up to the Irish people.” Gallagher spoke as if observing events his party played no active part in. The effect was menacing, particularly when he talked about the possibility that Brexit would result in a hard Irish border. “If there is a hard border in Ireland, and it is a manned or fixed installation, I can only assume it would be attacked,” he said, just as such installations were in the past.

Sinn Fein — the party that represents mainstream republicanism and whose leaders participated in the negotiations that led to the Good Friday Agreement — has offered a stark political response to the anger Brexit has fomented. Enshrined in the Good Friday Agreement is the “principle of consent,” which means that the people of Northern Ireland have a right to decide to which nation they want to belong. The demographics of Northern Ireland have been steadily shifting, and within the decade, a majority of its people will be Catholic, making the prospect of a united Ireland seem almost inevitable. This population shift is evident in election results that increasingly favor nationalists; in the United Kingdom parliamentary election in December, voters in Northern Ireland elected more nationalist representatives than unionist representatives for the first time in the country’s hundred-year history. Now Brexit has provided an opportunity for Sinn Fein to argue that the time to make that choice is near.

In July, I met Michelle O’Neill, Sinn Fein’s vice president, in her cavernous office in Northern Ireland’s palatial Parliament building. Brexit, she told me, had changed the paradigm in Northern Ireland, necessitating a referendum on Irish unity. Northern Ireland, she said, should not be dragged out of the European Union against its will. She seemed eager to assure not only her base but also the moderate unionists who voted to remain in the European Union and who might swing such a referendum. “I want to see a united Ireland,” O’Neill said. “But it has to be an inclusive Ireland. It has to be one where those who have an Irish identity and those who have a British identity feel part and parcel, feel that they have their place, and it’s valued and cherished.”

This seemed a shrewd political approach. But Northern Ireland’s history often reads like a case study in how the most extreme elements in the society can wreak undue havoc. Northern Irish police officers have warned that the threat from violent dissident republican groups remains severe even without the prospect of a hard Irish border. On the other side of the divide, many are outraged in the belief that the prospect of militant republican violence drove Boris Johnson and the European Union to keep the Irish border open at the expense of Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom.

After Johnson’s deal was announced, a few hundred loyalists, including reputed paramilitary members, met in East Belfast to discuss how they should respond to their perceived betrayal. Following the meeting, Jamie Bryson, a self-described “loyalist activist,” told local reporters that the Brexit deal would be met with mass resistance. “One of the main reasons we were told there can be no border on the island of Ireland is because dissident republicans may attack it, but yet there’s been no consideration given to the loyalist community on how people may react to a border down the Irish Sea,” Bryson told a reporter from The Belfast Telegraph. “I don’t think anyone in loyalism wants to see violence. But obviously there’s a lot of anger at the minute.”

On a June evening in East Belfast, a group of men belonging to a Protestant fraternal organization called the Orange Order gathered at their meeting place in a red-brick Victorian hall for a special occasion: the unveiling of a new parade banner. The Orange Order is a staunchly unionist organization founded in 1795 and is named after William of Orange, the Protestant king who in the late 17th century took the throne after King James II, a Catholic, was deposed in the Glorious Revolution. Every year in Northern Ireland, Orangemen — who number around 30,000 — conduct thousands of parades, and they’ve been staging them for centuries. The biggest day of parading falls on July 12, a Protestant celebration that marks William’s decisive victory over James at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, and on the eve of the holiday, unionists light large bonfires. These parades were historically seen as a display of Protestant supremacy, and they frequently led to sectarian clashes. Today they usually go off peacefully, though often under a heavy police presence. Orangemen say the parades are an innocent expression of their culture. Many nationalists still view them as intimidating.

This particular lodge, called the Young Men’s Christian Total Abstinence Loyal Orange Lodge 747, consisted, contrary to its name, largely of older gentlemen who wore suits and ties along with the orange sashes worn by Orangemen. The abstinence in this case was real — the men drank juice out of wineglasses — and the event began with the singing of a hymn. Then the parade banner, which had been covered with a white sheet, was unveiled, revealing a depiction of William of Orange atop a white horse at the Battle of the Boyne. The men applauded the banner, put on their bowler hats and filed out into the street, where a neatly uniformed marching band awaited. The drummers snapped and pounded, the flutists piped and the men marched their new banner past the brick rowhouses and storefronts of East Belfast, a working-class stronghold blighted in parts by poverty. The Orangemen strutted past homes decorated with flags of loyalist paramilitaries and murals showing armed paramilitary men in balaclavas. It made for a somewhat jarring juxtaposition, seeing men of such apparent decorum pass such harsh images. The Orangemen ended their march with a rendition of “God Save the Queen.”

Back inside the hall, as they dined on plates of roast beef and potatoes, a Presbyterian minister named Mervyn Gibson, the grand secretary of the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland, approached the lectern. “Today some are trying to bribe us out of the United Kingdom by claiming to offer us a better lifestyle in the Republic of Ireland,” he said. Gibson seemed to be referring to arguments that the Northern Ireland economy would flourish within a united Ireland. “Our loyalty and identity are not about economics,” Gibson went on, “not something to be bartered or traded.” Those now threatening a referendum on Irish unity, he added, were the same people who “tried to bomb and murder us out of the United Kingdom. They failed then, and they’ll fail again,” he said, and then concluded: “We’re born British, we’ll remain British, we’ll die British.” The men of the lodge responded: “Hear! Hear!”

The key question, it seemed, was how far these men would go to remain British. On another occasion, Gibson told me he would accept a democratic vote for Irish unity it if it came to that. Others, however, are more strident. Many loyalists feel a sense of decline as Catholics have gained more rights and upward mobility; young loyalist men in interface areas who used to be guaranteed factory jobs by virtue of their identity now face high unemployment and a sense that their standing in society has eroded. Such grievances seem to only reinforce people’s sense of identity. Loyalist paramilitaries feed off this to gain recruits, though according to the police, these groups are more often involved in organized crime than in politics. Still, in East Belfast, I observed how one paramilitary — the U.V.F. — had the capacity to stir up sectarian passions.

Last summer, in advance of the July 12 celebrations, members of Belfast’s republican-led City Council voted to remove a pyre made of wooden pallets in East Belfast — set up for the coming bonfire night — saying it was illegally on city property, namely the parking lot of a recreation center. Local loyalists responded angrily and vowed not to allow the city to remove the pyre, resulting in a standoff that, for days, became the main news story in town. At a demonstration one evening that drew hundreds of people to the site of the pyre, I met a number of masked young men who told me they were protecting the pyre from being dismantled. Jamie Bryson, the loyalist activist, spoke to the crowd. “Standing exposed tonight is the actual agenda of Belfast City Council,” he said. “And it is the total demolition of every aspect of Protestant unionist and loyalist culture,” he went on. “We will not have it!” This inspired a fervent round of applause. “No surrender!” shouted a woman next to me who wore a shirt that said “Me Wrong?” on it. “This is British land, and it will stay British land,” she then told me.

Police officers said the standoff was whipped up by the U.V.F. In a letter to the City Council, the police warned that any attempt to remove the pyre would “cause a severe, violent confrontation, orchestrated by the U.V.F.” and that the “use of firearms during such disorder cannot be ruled out.” Ultimately, the police did not move in. This was, Bryson later wrote in an online newsletter, a “momentous and hugely symbolic victory within the context of the larger cultural war.”

On the bonfire night, I went to another pyre on a barren plot next to a peace wall in West Belfast, where my tour guide, Robert, had taken me. As the sky slowly darkened, a D.J. played pulsing techno. Drunken teenagers milled around. A small, impromptu marching band of revelers formed. They sang a U.V.F. tune at the top of their lungs: “On my gravestone, carve a simple message: ‘Here lies a soldier of the U.V.F.’ ” I spoke to one woman among them who told me that this was all in good fun, just an expression of loyalist culture. But you couldn’t help noticing that the pyre that was about to be lit had been bedecked with flags of the Republic of Ireland.

______

James Angelos is a contributing writer for the magazine based in Berlin. He last wrote about anti-Semitism in Germany. Ivor Prickett is an Irish photographer. He was a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in breaking-news photography for his coverage of battles in Mosul and Raqqa.

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toomanyfamdom · 4 years

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15. a saying, joke, or hermetic meme that only people from your country will get?

Well, you got my friends and I talking so have a list. A long list. also most of these aren’t jokes or anything but its stuff you only get if you live here (I live in Northern Ireland btw ppl)

the ‘born in belfast’ song with the pug

its spelt craic not crack (as in banter)

pronouncing it as ‘NORN IRON’

saying ‘oh aye’ all the time

and ‘thats grand’

when you bump into someone OPH - SORRY MATE

FLEAGS

knowing exactly what type of area you’re in cause of the flags

(dont disscuss flags in NI)

(v bad idea)

when you’re ending a phone call, especially with older ppl ‘okay right that’s grand okay right see you later bye bye bye bye’ in one breath

the difference between a high school, grammar school and a private school

having some form of potatoes with most meals

‘pound for a chippy’

PASTIES AKA HEAVEN FROM THE CHIPPY

finally having a government after not having one for like 3 years

people saying ‘acwk you know your man’ or ‘your woman’ and everyone knowing exactly what your talking about

putting your table number up online (when you’re at Spoons) and everyone ordering you mushy peas

potato bread i repEAT POTATO BREAD

saying how now brown cow properly :)

That buzzfeed quiz that says most ppl don’t know who we are

being referred to as ‘Ireland’

having to explain the entire country’s history or just saying you’re from ireland when on holiday

BELFAST PRIDE (highlight of my year)

CHRISTMAS MARKET (another highlight)

CULTURE NIGHT!! (bros, performing at culture night was such a buzz lemme tell you. it was so special)

Traditional Irish Dancing! Not the wigs, fake tan, big, sparkly dresses, make up and overly bouncy irish dancing (plz dont kill me feis dancers, its impressive) but the natural hair and make up, traditional steps and dances, traditional dresses (bro i danced at Disneyland Paris and we got so many compliments and a feis dancer asked us how tf we did it cause we did a super slow dance w/ loads of leg extentions and slow movements and feis don’t do it)

so yeah, thats it aha. theres probs more but thats all my friends and I came up with

#hannahs asks #nothern ireland #bro this is so long #sorry #thanks for the ask mum!#much appreciated xx #love you #💜💜

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queencfwolves-archive · 4 years

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five kisses for @fcundwings

i. forehead kiss

the first time juan and erica kiss is when she's twelve and he's sixteen. he'd come to pick her up from school, and waited patiently outside, leaning against one of the light poles as his eyes scanned the swarm of students that exited the school. his face lit up as he noticed his best friend, but the smile immediately fell when he noticed the boys that surrounded her as she walked. her head was turned down as the older guys pushed and shoved her, seemingly making fun of her, and before he would help himself he's at her side, towering over the group. erica's eyes are filled with unshed tears, and in a flash he pushed the guys away from her, tucking the small blonde under his arm with a warning that if the boys ever bothered her again, they'd have to deal with him. he guided her away from the school, before taking a good look at her, and with a kiss to her forehead made her promise to tell him if this ever happened again. it's that day juan vowed to himself to destroy every single person that ever brought a single tear to her eyes, and where he became erica's hero.

ii. real kiss

by now erica is sixteen, juan is twenty and it's erica's first party. her mom would only allow her to go if juan did, so she pleaded and begged him to go with her, even used her puppy dog eyes. he was still hesitant, but also knew how much this would mean to her, so he begrudgingly agreed. for this occasion, erica took twenty dollars out of the box under her bed for juan's bail, and bought herself a cute new dress, and she's the happiest he'd seen her in a while. somewhere during the party, an empty bottle is pulled out, and it's lead to a mix of spin the bottle and seven minutes in heaven. as the game progressed, erica is nervous, because she's never kissed anyone before, and she really hoped that the bottle wouldn't land on her. but at some point, one of the others pointed out that she'd hadn't had a turn yet, and that goddamn bottle is shoved into her hand. feeling this deep need to fit in, she did as told, and by some miracle, the bottle ended up pointing at juan. with red cheeks, she allowed herself to be shoved into the small rooms that'd been dubbed 'heaven', unable to look him in the eye, until a finger under her chin tilted her head back, and she's met with those all too familiar brown eyes. without a word, juan leaned in and pressed a tentative kiss to her lips, and erica dediced fuck it, and kissed him back. though she wasn't sure what to do, she followed his lead blindly, and that was how erica got her first kiss from the boy that she trusted with all she had, and while it was clumsy and awkward, it was the best first kiss she could've ever asked for.

iii. wrist kiss

when erica is twenty two and juan is twenty six, he realized there is nothing left for him in queens, and after telling erica, she's sure to pack her bags too. after her mother passed, the only person she had left was him, so she would go wherever he did without a sliver of hesitation. when everything was packed, they stood in front of the brownstone building, and that's where the made a vow. that they would stick together, no matter where life took them. us against the world was what they'd promised one another. it had been erica's idea to solidify the vow forever, so after a quick trip to the parlor a friend of juan owned, both left with new ink added to their bodies. with their bags strapped to juan's bike, they left queens behind and headed east, on their way to a new life. and it was somewhere along the interstate when he took her right arm, which was wrapped around his waist tightly, brought her wrist up and pressed the softest kiss against the wrapped up words now marking her skin, and in return, she pressed her own lips against the leather of his jacket, between his shoulderblades, before the engine beneath them growled as juan sped over the asphalt.

iv. goodbye kiss

erica had begged and begged for the sons to take her with them when they went to belfast, but juice had been adement that it would be too dangerous. they didn't know what to expect, and he wouldn't be able to focus on the task at hand if erica was there, and he wasn't able to keep an eye on her at all times, so she conceded, when he did allow her to go with them to the hangar where the plane was leaving from. she stood back as they got everything together, her fingers nervously playing with the scuffed cuff of juice's hoodie. her eyes followed him wherever he went, because after today, who knew when she would see him again? nerves made her stomach grow tight. ever since leaving new york years ago, she hadn't gone without him for longer than a day or two, so letting him go without know when he'd be back was absolute hell for erica. she sat down in the far corner of the hanger, her knees hugged to her chest as she tried to keep it together. it was the last minute before take off that juan approached her, worry etched on his face, not even for himself but for his best friend. he knew that she'd be in good hands with those piney, but giving up control over the biggest part of his life still gave him anxiety. she stood up when he reached her, and hugged him as if she'd never see him again. the whispered promises of staying safe are exchanged just between the two of them, and with a kiss to erica's forehead, juice walked back to the plane. he's not even halfway there when he turned around to the sound of her heels against the concrete, and he easlity caught her when she threw herself at him. for a second she just remained wrapped in his arms before tilting her head back and kissing him. in the back of her mind she heard the cat calling from the others but she was focused on one thing, and one thing only. after a long moment she pulled back and whispered as soft 'i love you' before finally letting him go. she watched as the guys boarded, and with one last bright smile juice followed. she doesn't leave the hangar until the plane is way out of sight, revving the engine of juice's bike before making her way back to the club house.

v. a kiss when all is said and done

while everyone and their dead ancestors could see the way erica and juice were meant to be, it took them years to finally figure it all out. and today is the day everyone had been waiting for ever since erica and juice made it to charming. staring at herself in the mirror, she smoothed down the white dress that hugged her curves, her hair and make up done to perfection, courtesy of lyla and tessa, and erica couldn't be happier. she heard of brides that were nervous and scared on their wedding day, but she just felt and odd serenity. like life started making sense now. it had taken them over two decades, but now here they were. with a soft smile, she went over all those years in her mind, and part of her wondered how it could've taken her this long to realize what had been right in front of her all along, because every memory she had, he was there. he was the only one that'd stuck by her, that stood out. he was the one that always kept her grounded, who loved her despite everything, and she loved him right back, and she had, ever since they met when she was ten years old. the whole getting ready thing flew by, and before she knew it, erica stood at the door of the small chapel with tig. she glanced up at him, but quickly looked away when she noticed his misty eyes. how she'd gotten this lucky, to find this family, a father that accepted her was beyond her, but she'd spend the rest of her days thanking god for everything he'd given her. erica sucked in a breath when the doors were pulled open, butterflies fluttering in her stomach, until her eyes landed on him, all the way down the aisle. her one true love. if it hadn't been for tig, erica probably would've sprinted her way down the goddamn walk, because it took entirely too long for her liking. when she finally reached juice, tig let her go with a kiss to her temple, before taking his place beside chibs. two set of brown eyes met, and in that moment erica realized that this was it. a happily ever after she never thought she'd get. the priest's words were completely lost on her as she just stared up at her soon to be husband in awe, and it took two people to clear their throats to make her realize it was her turn to speak. vows and rings were exchanged, hollers and hoots at juice's comment about his leather and his bike, and then the kiss. the kiss that would solidify yet another vow. it was chaste for their doing, but this kiss meant more than anything before ever did. erica's arms wrapped around juice's neck right before he dipped her, which earned him a giggle and another round of cheers from the small circle of attendees, but it couldn't have been more perfect.

#fcundwings #pastrepentance#v. diosas finest. soa #dyn. us against the world. pastrepentance #drabble #long post for ts #This is literally 1.6k of fluff

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sxperflxity · 4 years

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@areswriites gets a plotted starter.

When she had first arrived in Belfast so many years ago, Tara Knowles was a young woman who was terrified to take a big step like the one she had been taking by going to Belfast in the first place. Of course, she wasn’t only thinking of herself when she had made the decision - her then four year old daughter coming with her, curious to see, just as much as Tara, where Tara’s mom had grown up. And that had been the surprise of the century for the young woman at that time - that her mom had originally been born in Belfast before moving to America, that she had had plans to take Tara there and meet her Mom’s side of the family, that her mom even had more family in Belfast than what Tara knew what to do with -- and for Tara, finding all of that out when she was as young as she was, in need of as much guidance as she was, and in need of a way to get away from the man she went on a few dates with -- Tara took the opportunity that had been presented to her when she first read her Mom’s letter to pack up and move herself and her daughter to Belfast so she could find out more about her Mom and maybe, just maybe, herself.

And when she had finally arrived in Belfast -- everything had turned upside down for her, in ways that she couldn’t quite comprehend - nor had she wanted to then, admittedly. The only thing that Tara had from her previous life was her precious daughter, and the letters she wrote to her father about her - letters that she hoped were finding their way to Jax, but she wasn’t sure about that, because surely if he had been reading them -- he would want his daughter, right? But moving to Belfast had changed Tara, changed her because she now had her doctorate - fast tracked so she could move and still be a doctor, thank the heavens, and when she met her Mom’s family, she completely fell in love with them - felt at home, and at ease, and like nothing could go wrong.

And then she learned that some of her cousins were a part of the Belfast charter for the Sons, and it was like everything was crumbling down around her. She had ran from the sons back at home, back in Charming, where everything and everyone she loved was, because she couldn’t handle it, and now - now it was like it was everywhere she went. Charming, and then college, and then her ex-boyfriend, only dating her so he could get information and now Belfast and Tara - Tara had wanted to scream and run when she realized that the sons were in Belfast. But --

But something had stopped her, and she couldn’t quite put a name to what it was that had stopped her. But now, years later, her daughter about to enter the years of a pre-teenager, Tara looked at the baby in the cradle that the father had brought with him, biting on her lower lip with a frown. The baby she was looking in on looked - looked so much like her daughter when she was a baby herself that Tara was stunned and confused and -- curious. She was incredibly curious, because if this baby looked so much like her daughter when she was a baby, then odds are --

But Tara didn’t like where that thought was headed, because it meant probably having to deal with Jax again, after all of these years, and all of those letters that were never replied to. Instead, she focused on the baby boy that Father had brought back with him, checking him over, making sure he was okay, making note of the heart defect he had (just like Jax’s family, just like her daughter) and taking a deep breath through it all, not realizing just how. much her life was going to change again when she decided to go visit Maureen after her shift.

She didn’t know, that as she walked through Maureen’s door hours later, talking about how she was so sure that the next few days were going to be hell, she’d look up and blink, shocked, stopping her statement before --

“---Jax,” she whispers, shaking her head while the entire room stops their conversation to stare at her.

#areswriites #muse: tara knowles / interactions #muse: tara knowles / jax teller #tw: long post #verse : tara | belfast we grew #auv001 / oldlvdyknowles ; belfast we grew

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mrmrswales · 5 years

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Prince William has hit out at British football clubs for treating young players as “financial assets” without caring enough about their mental health.

The Duke of Cambridge – who rarely points the finger of blame – last night said clubs were guilty of a “dereliction of duty” and called for radical changes in the game.

Wills, who is President of the Football Association, said: “Many players come from difficult backgrounds and may have all sorts of issues. So just to have them as a complete financial asset...it’s a dereliction of duty.”

The Prince was was applauded for his bold stand last night by Mirror Sport columnist Robbie Savage, who said: “It can only be a good sign Prince William, who genuinely cares for the game, is taking such an interest.

“This summer, dozens of teenagers who dream of a career in professional football will be released – and it’s important that they are not simply left to pick up the pieces.”

The Prince warned that too many clubs simply drop young players if they fail to reach a required standard, with no thought as to how to support them in building a new life.

William, 36, made the astonishingly candid comments during a meeting at Windsor Park, the home of the Irish Football Association in Belfast, on a two-day visit.

He told of his despair at the way players are discarded, saying they should be “supported” instead of being told to “move on”.

He said: “Some clubs don’t do anything about mental health. We’ve got to change the whole way we look after players.

“Many players come from difficult backgrounds and may have all sorts of issues going on. So just to have them as a complete financial asset...it’s a dereliction of duty, I think.”

William’s comments to members of Ahead of the Game, an organisation that delivers mental health support to grassroots football clubs are sure to hit home across the game – especially as so many names have been hit by mental health issues.

The community leaders told the Duke of the perils of young players being sold a dream after being signed up to football clubs with the lure of making it to the Premier league and earning millions of pounds.

The pressure youngsters are put under to succeed can often lead to crippling bouts of anxiety and depression, especially when they are “let go” by the clubs with little education and no future.

William’s comments have been echoed by Michael Bennett, the Professional Footballers’ Association’s head of welfare.

It emerged last year that a record number of players approached the body for support with mental health problems.

He said: “Clearly, not everyone is earning £100,000 a week.

“But there are things you don’t see; players could suffer an untimely death in the family or suffer a serious injury.

“Money isn’t going to stop emotional feelings surfacing.”

Former England and Liverpool striker Stan Collymore was deluged with support yesterday after revealing his latest bout of depression has left him “staying in bed for 20 hours a day”.

The Mirror Football columnist has suffered with mental illness for a number of years.

He described his current state in an emotional Twitter post this morning, saying: “Last 3 wks I’ve been in bed sleeping 20 hrs a day,stinking to high heaven, unable to wash.

“2nd worst bout of D (Depression) of my life filled with a longing to never wake.

“Today I’m going to the gym. To fight back.

“If you’re struggling, you’re not alone, and it will pass. Stay in the game.”

Burnley winger Aaron Lennon has also spoken publicly about his battle with depression.

The former England star was playing for Everton when he was diagnosed with a stress-related illness and sought help with experts at the Priory Hospital in his fight to get his life back on track.

William, who is in Northern Ireland with wife Kate until this afternoon, also highlighted the case for providing more support to the LGBT community in sport.

Revealing he has discussed the possibility of staging a “Mental Health FA Cup”, the Duke said: “We’re working on something with the FA at the moment, trying potentially to get a mental health FA Cup to have a really punchy campaign we can base something around

“I’m still intrigued and trying to understand, because no-one’s done any surveys, how much the LGBT community is linked in to the mental health problems in football.

“Are people being put off football because of LGBT reasons? Is it not integrated well with mental health issues within sport?

“I don’t think we’ve explored enough or know enough.”

Dad of three William has spoken openly of his own mental health battles being a helicopter pilot in the air ambulance.

He spoke of the benefits of the network of support he could rely on when dealing with the after effects of attending distressing road traffic accidents involving children.

In a discussion, in a meeting room at the stadium, he also raised questions about the next generations of sportsmen and women, wondering aloud about their resilience.

“We’ve been thinking about the stats and the evidence recently,” he said.

“Are we setting up some of our children at the moment for more mental health issues in the future, by the way we are creating a win-win situation and scenarios?

“I’ve been hearing that a bit recently and I’m trying to get my head around how we do it.

“Because resilience has to be built within everybody.

“From a very very young age, nobody wants to be told they’re not good at something but of course that could prove a difficult situation to handle when life comes along with school and jobs and so on.

“How do they learn to pick themselves back up again?

“When they lose a match, you’re gutted. But that’s part of what sport is all about. Every sportsman and women knows what it takes to be at the top of their game.”

#mental health #ni2019

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mesdea · 5 years

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Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy Rating: General Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Qui-Gon Jinn/Obi-Wan Kenobi Characters: Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi Additional Tags: Laundromat AU, Meet-Cute, Quinn is Qui-Gon, Ben is Obi-Wan, Fluff, Party Like It's 1999 Summary:

Quinn hoped to grade a few papers while waiting for his laundry to finish, but then a stranger entered the laundromat and shattered that expectation.

New Orleans was known for its Creole cuisine, distinct music, unique dialect and of course, Mardi Gras was something of an enigma for Quinn who had been in the city for a little over ten years. He migrated to The Big Easy after his mother passed away, leaving his birthplace of Ireland. Having been born to an Irish mother and an American father, he had dual citizenship and had often longed to see his father's home in Louisiana.

Normally, when travelers or first-time residents went to New Orleans, they had a tough time understanding the strange city. It appeared like no other place in the United States. Quinn was one of these travelers, first as a tourist and then quickly becoming a resident after finding old relatives on his father’s side. The first puzzling impression of the city usually came from the appearance of the French Quarter near many of the city's hotels. The size of the district surprised even those who have journeyed through the remaining United States. Few visitors are used to such a mess of people shuffling at all hours of the day and night in the center of the city. They promptly learned that bars have no closing hour, that the food is spicy, and that the music happened almost everywhere. They may have also taken note that the locals talk weirdly, but few have southern accents. Quinn’s lilting accent seemed to fit right in, even if it wasn't quite the same, as residents welcomed him with open arms.

When Quinn first found his roots, so to speak, he had left behind a lucrative position as a biology professor in Belfast. After just a few months of traveling the southern portion of Louisiana, also known as Acadiana, he found a tenured job at the private college of Tulane, held within the bustling city of New Orleans. He lived just off campus, which was ideal for him, as he could use public transportation and his feet, with no need for a car. However, the flat didn’t come equipped with a washer and dryer, so he often strolled late at night to the laundromat when the insomnia was too much to overcome.

This is where he found himself on this warm night, term papers spread upon the folding table as he waited for the washers to finish, so he could transfer his clothes to the dryer and perhaps go next door for some crawfish etouffee. Quinn knew he should skip the food and finish grading his student’s papers before Windu had his head on a pike. He was late last semester and never heard the end. Although he adored his job, speaking and guiding young students, he hated the politics that seemed to follow. He could always forgo sleep instead of grading the papers.

Just as he circled Tommy Boudreaux’s “D-” the chime on the door went off and the quiet clinking of the washers was interrupted by several mumbles, groans, and Scottish cuss words. Quinn looked up into the gorgeous pair of Gray-blue eyes as he witnessed the young ginger strip out of his white button-down shirt and head for an open washer.

“I don’t even know how to get this out!” The youthful man cussed even more than before as he tossed the shirt into the open lid and unzipped his trousers, suddenly realizing he was in public. He regarded Quinn and turned a lovely shade of cherry-red. “I’m sorry, I…” Benjamin stopped as quickly as he began, staring at the older gentleman, his graying hair pulled back into a thick full ponytail.

Quinn noticed the fellow had blood stains on his face, shirt, and pants, and he promptly jumped from his table and walked toward him. “Are you OK?” He went to reach for the lad, before realizing that he might not want a stranger in his personal space and pulled back.

“I’m fine. My clothes, however, are not." By the sound of the Scottish accent, not a local either, he held his head back, realizing that his nose was still bleeding. "I'm sorry, I was on my way to my hotel and was robbed." He let out a breath, wondering how he would make it to his morning appointment and look presentable. He could purchase clothes, but that wouldn't help until the stores opened in the morning.

"That is horrible and doesn’t set a good impression for a new arrival in our city." Quinn slipped into his pocket and pulled out a small handkerchief and handed it to the man. "Please, take this and tilt your head back. It will help. It doesn't look broken at least." Quinn tapped his own nose that had been broken a few times and never set.

"Thank you, Mr...."

"Quinton Jinn, but please call me Quinn."

"Benjamin Kenobi, but everyone calls me Ben." The lad once again turned a lovely shade of pink, and Quinn wondered how often he could bring that color out of him. Was he trying to flirt with a stranger, half his age, inside a laundromat?.

"I would say that it is a pleasure to meet you, but this doesn't seem like the happiest of situations." Quinn waved at the man's clothes. "I'm assuming they took your suitcase, along with any change of clothes?"

Ben nodded and peered down at the shirt in the washer. "I don't even know how to get the blood out and I have a very important interview tomorrow." Ben wondered why he was unloading all this onto a perfect stranger, but the man had a commanding presence that calmed him.

Quinn brightened and held up a finger, quickly dashing out of the establishment and next door to the 24-hour dinner. He asked the night manager and owner, Dexter, for two bowls of etouffee, some sweet tea with lemon, a few packs of salt and a small bowl of baking soda. Walking back into the laundromat, Quinn looked at the miserable lad, head in his hands, his face alight with worry. "Never fear, we'll get that blood out. Off with those pants."

Ben let out a tiny squeak at those words, his ears and neck joining his cheeks in a deep blush, why couldn't he control himself? "I have nothing," he trailed off as he watched Quinn laugh deeply. Oh, how that rumble did things to him, things that wouldn't be appropriate when half-naked in the laundromat. Ben watched as Quinn went to the dryers and pulled out a large gray t-shirt and handed it to him.

"It's still damp, but it will be big on you allowing some modesty." Ben smiled and shed his pants, throwing on the shirt. Quinn was right, it was more of a nightgown on him, but at least he wasn't sitting in anything but his pants.

"Thank you, but I still don't know how to get the blood out."

Quinn let out a cheerful rumble and handed him a container of food. Ben opened the container and the smell of spice and seafood was heavenly. He hadn't eaten since arriving and his mouth watered. "This smells glorious, thank you, but how is this going to help my pants?"

"The food is for you to enjoy, I will take care of your pants." Quinn got the lemons, tea, salt, and baking soda from his bag and headed for the nearby sink. "First you always use cold water. Mix the baking soda into a paste and rub on the stain." He began, just like he was lecturing his students. He then set the pants over the sink and grabbed his own container or food. "We leave it to sit for a few minutes and enjoy Dexter's best meal, Crawfish Etouffee. I hope you aren't allergic to seafood?"

"Not at all, this smells wonderful. Thank you, Quinn." Ben beamed. Quinn felt his heart tug, wanting to see that smile more.

"You are welcome. After we eat, we will rinse the stains in cold water and rub the lemon and salt in, after that we can put them in the washer." They both dug into their meal, neither saying much, just enjoying the company and great food.

Ben swallowed his last bite and let out a soft moan. "That.was heaven."

"No, that was Nawlins." Quinn gulped, wondering what else could make this beautiful creature moan.

"Haha, funny," Ben mumbled.

After their meal, Quinn finished rubbing out the stains and started the washer for his new acquaintance. Ben glanced over at the folding table and motioned to the papers. "I'm sorry that I interrupted your work."

"Honestly, it was a blessed break from Tommy Boudreaux's "D-" paper on how football can save the environment. Any break from that is welcome. It's the one thing I don't understand in this state, everything can be explained or tied to football, well their American football."

"You're a professor?" Ben straightened out.

"Yes, I'm a biology professor at Tulane. My department head, Windu, who incidentally is a pain in my ass will have my head if I don't have these papers graded and posted soon, but I find I don't care at the moment." Ben swore he saw Quinn wink at him.

"Wait, who?" Ben stood up, stock still and felt the need to cover up.

"Mace Windu, head of the science department at Tulane. Are you okay, Ben? You are turning absolutely white." Quinn moved closer to Ben, offering him a hand if the lad was feeling faint.

"This can't be happening," Ben mumbled and pulled further away. "I'm sorry Mr. Jinn." Quinn frowned at the formality, wondering what he had done.

"Please, it's Quinn. Did I offend you, somehow?" Ben looked up into the confused, sad eyes and cursed his awkwardness.

"You didn't, I'm sorry. What a mess! The reason I was so upset about my clothes is that I have a job interview tomorrow at Tulane with Professor Mace Windu. I was hoping to be the new Environmental Science professor and here I am half naked, flirting with one of the top professors in his department!"

"Flirting?" Quinn looked hopeful. "Your interview is not with me, Ben. Mace Windu has never listened to anything I've had to say on any subject, much less, department hiring. Besides, it takes two to tango."

Ben let his hands fall to his side, exhaling a breath as his anxiety dropped. "I'm sorry, this is just...this is not how I pictured this trip going. I wanted this job, want this job."

"Be yourself, Ben. Mace is a fair, if stubborn, man. He will look at your resume, ask his questions and determine if you are a good fit for our team. If he cared only about outward appearances, do you think he'd have hired me? At best the kids describe me as a spaced-out hippy with my long gray hair. I often skip the sports coat for a comfortable polo or t-shirt, I couldn't care less about outward appearances."

"You think I have a shot, even if the stains don't come out?" Ben leaned in closer, his eyes smiling with mirth.

"If there are stains to be seen, be honest with him. Mace will understand and probably take it personally that his city was responsible for such a travesty." Quinn really wanted to reach out and touch this lovely creature to calm his fears. When did he ever get so protective over strangers?

"Thank you for everything. If I held the city accountable for the mugging, I would also hold it in high regard for the kindness you’ve shown me." The two men sat with each other and bantered back and forth, waiting for their clothes to dry, shoulders touching as they got to know each other.

The dryer buzzed, and they both jumped up to check their results. Quinn got their first, using his long legs to his advantage. He pulled out Ben’s pants and shirt and held them up to the light. “Tada! Maybe I have a job as a dry cleaner if Biology doesn’t work out?”

Ben grabbed the shirt and carefully looked it over. “I can’t believe it, it’s as good as new!” Without a second thought, he reached out to Quinn and gave him a tight embrace. His long arms wrapped around him in return. Quinn couldn’t help but enjoy the smell of vanilla and Ben invading his senses. He could get used to this.

Ben withdrew, a shy smile plastered to his lips as he started to get dressed once again as Quinn folded his own clothes and placed them into a worn duffle, the papers once again stacked neatly and placed in a briefcase. “I guess this is goodbye.” Ben held out his hand.

Quinn always thought New Orleans was a melting pot of all sorts of characters. It was that life essence of each individual that made New Orleans like no other city, it was the ability to make strangers come together and help each other when needed. Quinn took a hand in his own and pulled Ben into a short embrace, kissing his cheek. They both hoped to meet again in the morning with something to celebrate. In the Big Easy, there was always a celebration to be had, no matter the time of day!

#quiobi #qui gon #obi wan #party like its 1999 #jinnobi #laundromat au #meet cute

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